"more money than brains?"

Uu> From: cdodhner@indirect.com ("Christian D. Odhner")

 > ViaCrypt PGP will be available in the USA and Canada, for an introductory
 > price of $100...for a single user
                         ^^^^^^
 Uu> Ok, I just spoke with Dave somebody at viacrypt, and he told me that
 Uu> the ViaCrypt PGP would be based on PGP 2.3a, and the only code changed
 Uu> would be the lines implementing rsa itself.
 ...
 Uu> improvements were made to ViaCrypt PGP, the same improvements would be
 Uu> made to the freeware version. I was thinking that if a bunch of us
 Uu> cypherpunks wanted copys we could order them...

Only one question:  WHY?  If PGP is freeware for noncommercial single
users, why on earth would anyone wish to drop $100 +/- for single-user
rights to a virtually identical program?

The mind boggles.  I know that the principal Cypherpunks are rich, but
I'm sure they could find more worthy charities than ViaCrypt...like
getting me a new modem, for example...

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M. Stirner: 
> Only one question:  WHY?  If PGP is freeware for noncommercial single
> users, why on earth would anyone wish to drop $100 +/- for single-user
> rights to a virtually identical program?

There are several business proposals floating around the cypherpunks
community that would require commercial licenses.  I encourage the
various crypto-entrepreneurs elaborate if they wish.  

Some of the proposals are quite interesting and illuminating.
There's a strong habit of keeping business ideas "trade secret", 
which can be a bad idea, since (a) many of the ideas
are obvious; trade secrets only work for subtle but important
technological bottlenecks known to a small group of mutually
trustworthy people, and (b) many of the ideas need to
debugged by a wide variety of crackers and experts before they will
provid good privacy.  Trade secrets also inhibit the progress
of the cypherpunks agenda, but that's a judgement call; I myself
dont' feel morally bound to Reveal All for the sake of the 
Movement.  But, "I'll post mine if you post yours".

Nick Szabo					szabo@netcom.com

M. Stirner: 
> Only one question:  WHY?  If PGP is freeware for noncommercial single
> users, why on earth would anyone wish to drop $100 +/- for single-user
> rights to a virtually identical program?

Well, I've had dealings with a couple of business clients who refuse
to use freeware PGP it because of 'the shaky legal ground'.  We
explained that as a government agency, we can use PGP legally, and
because (in each case) the business already had rights to use RSA for
their own purposes, there was no problem.  They said if they could buy
it, that'd make it a lot easier to use.  (These same businesses refuse
to distribute FSF/GNU code for similarly vague legal reasons.)